Help Holly Get WICKED!

Big news! Holly was picked as a finalist at last night's Universal Studios Citywalk Wannabe Wicked competition 4th round semi-finals!!! This means that she will be performing again on August 20th for the grand prize (which includes a walk-on appearance during a WICKED performance!) In addition to the judges' pick that night, there is a fan favorite competition that will be occurring prior to the final round. Here are the particulars:

Audition Videos of the Semi-Finalists for each round of the Competition selected by the
Judges will be displayed and accessible on the Universal website at www.CityWalkHollywood.com on August 13, 2008. The Audition Videos will then be rated by anyone who chooses to log onto the site and vote for the “Wannabe Wicked Fan Favorite.” Voters can vote for the “Wannabe Wicked Fan Favorite” as many times as they would like between 9:00am PST, August 13, 2008 until 11:59 pm August 19, 2008.

Here are some pictures/video from the semi-final round last night:
Posing, pre-show, with a WICKED balloon
Getting some last minute info

The emcee, RoRoIn front of The Emerald City map for a photo

Opening intros for the 10 semi-finalists

Performance of "For Good" and Judges Critique

(sorry for the distortion, but this was taken with our little point and shoot camera)

Singing "Dear Old Shiz"

Cutting off RoRo, after she hit the high note at the end of Dear Old Shiz

Here's Holly getting picked as a finalist (Georgia's timing here is perfect - nice shot Georgia!). Holly says that her exact words in this moment were, "WHAT??? SHUT UP!!!"

Message of congrats from OZ

"Whew!!! Ok, now it's three more weeks..."

In the meantime, GO VOTE!!! Well, voting doesn't start 'til the 13th, so go practice voting. When the time comes just imagine you're in Chicago: vote early and often! It'll be a clickfest folks - you can vote as many times as you want.

And if you're available for the Wednesday, August 20th finals contest, then come up to Universal Studios CityWalk and get WICKED with us!!!

Water Slide

This summer we've been so fortunate to have a lot of visits from loved ones. We've recently had a great gathering with Holly's family, some of whom came from as far as Massachucetts. The boys have had a great time with their cousins Ileana and Gabriel, including a couple of fun afternoons at a nearby water slide. We'll hopefully get a lot more pictures up from the whole vacation, but for starters here's a great sequence of Jackson and Ileana and the end of a water slide run.

Summertime, and the livin' is easy...

Just thought I'd post a few pics of the kiddies enjoying some of what summer in So Cal has to offer. Our three guys enjoyed running around the sand with their cousins a couple weeks back. You can see the reddish pink light in the picture. Often the marine layer comes in at evening time and the sun "sets" early, but that day we got to watch it all the way down to the water.

Here are some closer shots of the Jones boys sitting on the grass on a school field trip...
















clambering around a newly chalked climber...




















and ascending a step ladder in the front yard during car wash time.

Moving back indoors, Grandpa had Jackson and Ethan enthralled with some vintage Lionel toy trains. Guess what Santa will probably have in his sack this Christmas...

More pics soon!